The sound you hear is the #BCNDP breathing a huge sigh of relief as the two rightwing parties continue fighting.
“B.C. Conservatives Leader John Rustad rejected proposed 'non-competition' agreement, Kevin Falcon says”
My cup overflows with anger toward these lying, deceiving, murderous, oil and gas companies. So this morning, I did something I've never done before in hopes the people coming home from their long weekends in Tofino and Ucluelet get the message.
Ontario First Nations denied equal access to justice, lawsuit alleges
Lawsuit says the lack of resources is harming First Nations people
"A statement of claim filed by the Chiefs of Ontario says that many provincial and federal laws — including those related to tenancy, land management and environmental protection — don't apply on reserves."
State or State Sponsored attack on BC Government systems happened a month ago but was kept secret until this week on advice from cyber security experts.
1/2 Today in, "Chris writes to Politicians” 🤣
I wrote to the British Columbia Minister of Emergency Management and Climate Readiness today in relation to this news that she was negotiating with Meta to try to get access to Facebook to post emergency updates. How did we allow ourselves to be so beholden to these corporations for basic communication!
Here is my letter:
Dear Minister Ma (EMCR.Minister@gov.bc.ca)
CC: My Local MLA Minister Josie Osborne
I understand and agree with why you feel you must try to get Meta to allow you to post Emergency messages on that platform, especially during the fire season when we all now face so much uncertainty.
However, you must also acknowledge that:
Meta has made it clear its concern is curating its own content and “news” for its own financial benefit separate from any public benefit consideration.
You will never be able to control the algorithm on any Meta platform, so while you may post, you are still never guaranteed that your message can reach 100% of the people 100% of the time.
You as a Minister and as a representative of the Government of British Columbia cannot rely on third parties to get timely messaging out to communities and citizens. You are government, you have the means and responsibility to get the message out directly.
The question is how do you, as government, use social media directly? This has not been possible before, but it is now.
The answer is the Open Social Web. You may cringe at this example (and rightly so), but the pioneer and most famous person using the Open Social Web tools for public communication is Donald Trump with his “truth.social”.
If you don't understand how the alt-right pipeline works then you won't understand how we stop Pierre Poilievre. What alt-pipeline offers is hope, and community. Criticizing PP does not get people either of those things. Convincing people that PP is bad won't make them want to vote for the other failing parties.
Unless we run candidates who can offer hope, without the bigotry, PP wins. Join me in forming a new party.
See the replies for more info.
We need is a party that does politics differently. We need to be bold and unafraid. We need real solutions. I think we should push for the following things:
Real privacy laws.
If you have ideas please share them.
We also need to distance ourselves from toxic "leftists". We can save democracy only if we work together. All are welcome.
Vancouver Island University, my employer, is now threatening to remove the encampment and have people arrested. I'm absolutely sick.
I had corresponded with our President on May 1. I sent this to our Chancellor, Chair and President today.
Dear Chancellor Sayers, Chair Anderson, and President Saucier,
I am extremely concerned by the escalatory words and actions of VIU today given the encampment’s peaceful and respectful nature and disposition to date. The President has stated to me in her response quoted below on May 1 "that VIU’s approach to the encampment is based on respect and peace for protest and freedom of expression.”
The locking of all campus buildings today and the very clear threat by VIU Security (see attached noticed link) to have peace officers remove tents and equipment under the Trespass Act under threat of arrest is completely contradictory to the President’s statement and is exactly the approach that I flagged to the President as being extremely dangerous and likely to result in harm to the protesters and deep embarrassment to the University itself. There are peaceful ways to do this.
As an institution that is supposed to be fully immersed in the spirit and action of Truth and Reconciliation, I find these statements and actions to be horrendously contradictory, misguided, colonial, and dangerous.
As an individual employee, VIUFA faculty member, and member of this community on Snuneymuxw, Coast Salish and Nuuchanulth lands I am embarrassed, and I beg the University to reconsider and reverse its actions.
I'd just like to say I've been to enough protests of various topics that I have, in the past, seen anarchists, black block types, etc. I know what they look like.
I saw them before the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver, and another time in Vancouver at a Climate protest. In both cases they were a tiny TINY portion of the crowd and stuck out like a sore thumb and have never, in my experience, ever been acting in connection with the overall group. They are their own thing.
There has been nothing of that sort in any protest that I have seen in these #Palestine protests. So any suggestion of such is, in my opinion, a pure fabrication and an incitement and dog whistle to Police to justify violence against the encampments.
Happy Dental Care Day Canada!! (at least if you're over 70 without private insurance)
I hope that in time this will become part of universal single-payer healthcare (along Drug Coverage) and eliminate private insurance for health needs, but it's a start at least. And it happened because a centre-left party, the NDP, has an agreement to work with the minority government.
Back on the CO2 travel kick... equivalent of the day:
A 40km crossing on a BC Ferry from Nanaimo to Vancouver produces the same CO2 per passenger (5kg) as an 1800km high speed train journey from London, UK to Valencia, Spain.
We need to completely rethink travel in Canada but our political leaders are transportation cowards.
"The Ontario Provincial Police has launched a review after one of its officers was recorded vocally supporting — and possibly helping — protesters outside an event with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau earlier this week."